Side story on the recent gun spree

[slapout9]

I hope Slap will get into this, but these actions don't come from nowhere. These killers almost always have a criminal past of some kind or a history of violence or something.. They aren't good guys. I read a book about the NYPD cold case squad and one of the detectives said most all killings have to do with face. The killer figured he got dissed and wants some back. Normal people don't murder because they got dissed.

Just take a look at the most recent school shooting. The suspect had a long history of mental problems and had been in and out of treatment until his mother became so disenchanted with the supposed treatments she attempted to take care of her child herself. Hopefully more will come out about the total lack of appropriate public psychiatric care in this country.

Dr. Park Dietz has been one of the lone forensic Psychiatrist with the courage to come out against the Republican budget cutters who are the REAL PROBLEM to the mass violence problem, not gun control and not the NRA. As Dietz has bravely pointed out this started with the Reagan revolution to destroy the public mental health system and give tax cuts to rich people and has continued on to create the problem we have now, up to the point where we basically no longer have a public mental health system worth anything.

If you haven't noticed this is real sore spot with me. To include my own Governor who just recently closed one of the last physical mental health hospitals that LE would have access to as far as getting people the treatment they needed and keeping THE PUBLIC TRULY SAFE by controlling sick people and criminals instead of this left over commie gun control stuff. The greatest threat to Americans is not people with guns it is pinheads with college degrees that can make or influence public policy in this country.

Since the most recent shooting several people have asked for my opinions and advice and I still give the same advice which is something I learned long ago from a training officer. "Never fear the weapon, but always fear the man, because a man can always find a weapon" still very true and still very good advice. The only thing I would add is to be especially scared of people with college degrees that think they are smarter and know what is best for you and know more about making the proper policies of this country............they don't.

Roll Tide....

[Ken White]

However, in fairness to the Politicians, Republican and Democratic, their failures in this regard were broadly supported. One shouldn't forget that the Psychiatric and Psychologist communities were broadly but actively and decisively supportive of that dismantling for 'professional' -- or financial due to our terribly flawed medical insurance model (and the ever changing, ever interesting DSM) -- reasons...

Like any foul up, there's egg for a lot of faces

[carl]

Slap:

To further what Ken said, the de-instutionalzation (sic) movement was in full force long before Reagan came. It started just after WWII gained steam in the 50s and 60s (thank you Ken Kesey) and really took off in the 70s.

http://www.crimeandjustice.org/councilinfo.cfm?pID=55

[Firn]

However, in fairness to the Politicians, Republican and Democratic, their failures in this regard were broadly supported. One shouldn't forget that the Psychiatric and Psychologist communities were broadly but actively and decisively supportive of that dismantling for 'professional' -- or financial due to our terribly flawed medical insurance model (and the ever changing, ever interesting DSM) -- reasons...

Like any foul up, there's egg for a lot of faces

I wonder what kind of system is in place in the US to help persons with mental problems and thus also society as a whole. Here in Italy, as far as I know it is not seen as terribly effective and it is very difficult to 'measure' that 'objectively'. The recent cuts have also put considerable strain on it.*

*Public organisation seem sometimes more prone to cut effective elements to make a statement for more funds rather then becoming more efficient. I have no idea if this is the case right now.

Homicide Trends in the U.S

As it is per a 10000 capita, the demographic change is partly fitted in. I guess the urban population is younger, which would affect of course the rate of urban homicide relative the rural ones and thus also gun violence.



The urban areas certainly suffer much more from various crime forms.



The biggest differences:

..................Urban Small City Sub-urban Rural
Drug related 67.4% 9.9% 18.1% 4.5%
Gang related 69.3% 13.1% 16.9% 0.7%

Intimate 40.7% 14.5% 28.0% 16.8%
Family 38.7% 13.2% 29.1% 19.0%
Workplace 31.4% 13.4% 37.2% 17.9%

Note: Large cities have a population of 100,000 or more while small cities have a population of less than 100,000.

[Firn]

As I have too much images posted I have to double-post:

Check how the overall fall in handgun homicides coincides with the fall of homicides in larger cities. There are of course other factors at work, but there seems to be a pretty strong relationship, which would be not surprise much. To honest it looks like too good of a fit which makes me almost doubt graph 1. I guess that is the result if you had correct the works/papers of other students...

[Firn]

A look at Canada:

Study: A comparison of urban and rural crime rates

Of the 658 homicides in Canada in 2005 with a known location, 427 were committed in large urban areas, 95 in small urban areas and 135 in rural areas.

Taking population into account, the homicide rate of 2.5 homicides per 100,000 people in rural areas was actually higher than the rate of 2.0 in large urban areas and the rate of 1.7 in small urban areas. This pattern has held constant over the past decade.

However, robbery and motor vehicle theft were much more likely to occur in big cities than in small cities or rural areas. The robbery rate for large urban areas was more than double that for small urban areas and almost 10 times that for rural areas. The motor vehicle theft rate in large urban areas was about 25% higher than in small urban areas and 80% higher than in rural areas.

If you read the bit about the laws of small numbers and keep in mind the differences in (medical) infrastructure between the larger urban areas compared to say rural areas then you will be quite careful at reading too much into this result as well. It is much safer from a statistical point of view to work with (much) larger samples. So it is important to be sceptical when faced with this kind of graphs - without going too far into the other extreme.

Handguns are the firearm of choice in big-city homicides

In 2005, just over one-third of all homicides in both large urban areas and rural areas were committed with a firearm, compared with less than one-quarter of homicides in small urban areas.

Handguns were the weapon of choice in large urban areas, used in 76% of all firearm homicides. In rural areas, rifles or shotguns were the most prevalent; they were used in 65% of firearm homicides.

Weapons more common in large urban areas in Quebec and Ontario

In Quebec and Ontario, the only provinces where data on weapon use in violent crimes were available for both urban and rural areas, about 1 in 6 violent incidents involved a weapon of some sort, most commonly a knife.

Weapons were present more frequently in large urban areas than in small urban areas and rural areas of these two provinces. About 1 in 5 violent incidents in large urban areas involved a weapon, compared with about 1 in 8 in small urban areas and rural areas.

The proportion of violent crimes involving a firearm was about two to three times higher in large urban areas. In 2005, 3.2% of violent crimes in the large urban areas of Quebec and Ontario involved a firearm, compared to 1.1% in small urban areas and 1.4% in rural areas.

When a firearm was present, handguns were more prevalent in large urban areas than in the other areas. Handguns were used in three-quarters of crimes committed with a firearm in big cities compared to about half in small cities and one-third in rural areas.

The difference between the use of firearms in homicides between Canada and the US is very considerable indeed. Firearms account for the clear majority of US homicides, while in Candada it is roughly a third. Rifles and shotguns seemed to used much more in relative terms in rural Canada compared to the US but we need more data on that.

Note to readers

Large urban areas are defined as Census Metropolitan Areas (CMAs). A CMA represents one or more adjacent municipalities centered on an urban core of at least 100,000 persons. Based on police boundaries, large urban areas accounted for 65.5% of the Canadian population in 2005.

Small urban areas are defined as any urban area not part of a CMA that has a minimum population of 1,000 persons and a population density of at least 400 persons per square kilometer. Small urban areas accounted for 17.4% of the population in 2005.

Rural areas are defined as all areas of the country not falling into either the large urban or small urban categories. In 2005, rural areas accounted for 17.1% of the population.

All in all it is remarkable how little violence is done by so many humans with so many weapons. The drop in homicides in larger cities, especially those over a 1,000,000 is highly interesting and IIRC another topic discussed it already. NYC and Los Angeles account of course for a majority of the population of those 9 cities with the effectivness of it's policies having a massive impact on the aggregate.

[slapout9]

However, in fairness to the Politicians, Republican and Democratic, their failures in this regard were broadly supported. One shouldn't forget that the Psychiatric and Psychologist communities were broadly but actively and decisively supportive of that dismantling for 'professional' -- or financial due to our terribly flawed medical insurance model (and the ever changing, ever interesting DSM) -- reasons...

Like any foul up, there's egg for a lot of faces

You know something, as usual You are absolutely right!!!! My own Governor, who I voted for, is not just a Republican, but he is a Doctor.... a Medical Doctor!! and he went to the only proper University in the world, The University of Alabama but he thinks what he did is a good thing....I just can't figure these people out, somehow they think by simply ignoring and not properly funding things that somehow things are just going to magically fix themsleves......it's the invisible hand theory of Mental Health and the role of Government.

[KenWats]

Dr. Park Dietz has been one of the lone forensic Psychiatrist with the courage to come out against the Republican budget cutters who are the REAL PROBLEM to the mass violence problem, not gun control and not the NRA. As Dietz has bravely pointed out this started with the Reagan revolution to destroy the public mental health system and give tax cuts to rich people and has continued on to create the problem we have now, up to the point where we basically no longer have a public mental health system worth anything.

A bit of a thread derailment, and I apologize in advance.

As a man whose wife has worked as a psychologist in both a State Prison and now, a State Mental Institution, I can agree with you that the system needs to be improved somehow. It's scary and sad to me who ends up out in the community. It's also very surprising to me who ends up "sane enough for trial". There's a lot of crazy in prison. Also, a lot of sane jerks (she uses a different word) trying to look like they're crazy. I don't know which stories she tells me are funnier.

[slapout9]

A bit of a thread derailment, and I apologize in advance.

As a man whose wife has worked as a psychologist in both a State Prison and now, a State Mental Institution, I can agree with you that the system needs to be improved somehow. It's scary and sad to me who ends up out in the community. It's also very surprising to me who ends up "sane enough for trial". There's a lot of crazy in prison. Also, a lot of sane jerks (she uses a different word) trying to look like they're crazy. I don't know which stories she tells me are funnier.

Not a derailment at all!!! It is spot on, and it is much more of a step to finding a solution then just saying...... It's all the Guns fault it!

[slapout9]

Everybody needs to watch this for some real truth about gun violence.
You are far more likely to be killed by a medical error than any type of gun violence.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SK7WrsnuDPc

[Fuchs]

Everybody needs to watch this for some real truth about gun violence.
You are far more likely to be killed by a medical error than any type of gun violence.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SK7WrsnuDPc

Rankings of causes of death are useful for a rational allocation of attention (I attempt to divert attention away from errorists with 'em).

This specific video on the other hand has a strong smell of propaganda and partiality.

[carl]

This specific video on the other hand has a strong smell of propaganda and partiality.

Here ya go Fuchs. A Wall Street Journal article quite soberly written. 98,000 annual deaths in the US from preventable medical mistakes.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...334441352.html

[Firn]

As Fuchs says proper ranking is important to support an efficient allocation of ressources. I remarked how little homicides are actually comitted with the vast arsenal of firearms dispersed in Western countries. Still far far more then by terrorists but overall we have surprisingly peaceful societies, at least compared to the some in which our ancestors lived.

In this context the graphics I posted show that for some reasons gun homicides dropped a great deal roughly twenty years ago. Almost all of it is due to fewer killings done with handguns in bigger cities, especially the biggest, with both the victim and shooter relative likely to have a criminal record. From a police and political point of view curbing this type of homocide should be the 'easiest' to target for obvious reasons. In this case focused gun control and police/government action can be quite efficient.

It is much more difficult to curb the type of shooting which has restarted the debate about gun laws. Far fewer dots to connect, no links to typical criminals. Health care and social support are of great importance. A low amount of firearms per capita makes it obviously much harder for such mentally disturbed persons to do such terrible things, but in a country like the US simply the vast amount of firearms in circulation makes it very difficult that moderate laws reduced that risk by a significant degree. (Especially since the most commone homicide weapon is a simple, run-of-the-mill handgun which works well enough without some easily banable evil feature.) The harsh UK approach on handguns must have consumed very considerable public ressources. Maybe somebody with knowledge on it could step in.